Wireless router + separate switch - port forwarding

Question

I am building a new home and I have network cables running to every room essentially (around 11-12 locations).

In the past I have had a wireless router that has a 4 port switch, which has worked okay because I just used wireless for most things. Now that I have potentially 12 locations that all need to be active at one time the router no longer cuts it, since it only has a 4-port switch.

I'm thinking I can keep my wireless router with 4-port switch, and hook up a 12-16 port switch to one of the connections on the router. My question is how does port-forwarding work in this configuration? Does the separate switch have a single IP address or will it work essentially the same as the 4-port switch on the wireless router?

Any good resources someone can point me to would be great as well, as this will be my first venture into a larger home network.

Answer 1

You can do this.

Port forwarding operates on the IP layer, while switching is one level below. You could theoretically daisy-chain as many switches as you want, just be careful not to make any loops in the connections. You can port-forward to whichever IP address you want, same as before, as it is unrelated to how the switches are configured.

While the switch itself may have an IP, it is used for management only, and has no bearing on the configuration of your network.